Digital Rights Lounge
15:00 - 16:00
French
Meetup
Everyone
Civic Tech for Government Transparency - The case of the Mali 2018 presidential elections

Kurzthese

New initiatives based on the use of information and communication technologies enable citizens to participate in the management of public life with a perspective to making governance democratic, transparent and inclusive. We talk about Civic Tech. During this session, we present how the internet and the use of mobile phones have supported CSO and government to increase civic engagement and ensure the transparency of the electoral process of the 2018 presidential elections in Mali.

Beschreibung

Civic Tech is used to increase citizen participation in public life and to increase the transparency of the rulers. They can serve as bridges between civil society and government in favour of transparency.

In Mali, civil society has implemented OpenESR, a web and SMS technology, to observe the elections in real time, allow the electoral management bodies to correct irregularities and allow citizens to access the results of their polling station.

At the same time, civil society has used a web application called “Electoral compass” to help citizens to better understand electoral programmes and to compare their own views to those communicated by the different presidential candidates.

In this session, we will present how these two Civic Tech initiatives have built a bridge between civil society organisations, government bodies and political parties to increase civic engagement and for more transparent elections in Mali in 2018. We will also discuss what role donors, authorities and companies have played in empowering these Civic Tech initiatives.

This session will be hosted by Tidiani TOGOLA, Founder and CEO of Tuwindi Foundation, Mali. Discussions can take place in English and French.

Speakers